Putative father lacked standing under the Uniform Parentage Act (UPA) to determine the existence of a parent-child relationship with the children, even assuming putative father was an “interested party” under the UPA, where mother’s husband had presumed father status, putative father never married or attempted to marry mother, and putative father never received the children into his home despite considerable efforts to do so.
Laura Morgan is a Family Law Consultant. Laura is available for consultation, brief writing and research on family law issues throughout the country. She can be reached through her Web site.
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M. Jepsen
Both biological parents should have equal rights to their biological children, irregardless of the mother’s marriage to someone else . In this case the biological father is also married to someone else. Why should her marital status and her husband have priority over the biological father’s marital status and void his rights to be a parent to his child, or in this case, his children? It shouldn’t. If the biological father comes forward within the first two years of his child’s life and files a paternity action, then DNA should immediately be ordered. If the father is then proven to be the biological father, then subsequent court-ordered visitation and child support should immediately follow. CA statutes need to be updated to give a biological father all the same rights as the biological mother. This issue should not involve the biological mother’s husband or the biological father’s wife. It is about who the biological parents are and that their rights to their biological children are EXACTLY EQUAL UNDER THE LAW. The State of CA has basically made Neil, as with the biological father in the Dawn D. case, a non-person who has no rights to parent his children in situations like this. This is an abomination of the law, and is unequal and archaic in its thoughts and deeds against a man, a father, who comes forward and wants to be a parent and father to his child – all because he loves his child just as much as the mother loves her child. That right should never be taken from a biological parent, as long as they are not criminals of any kind, of course. The marital presumption law favoring the mother, which is basically what CA statutes are written to support, should not override a father’s love and devotion to his biological children and his desire to parent his offispring.